Welcome to our new website, North Reading Votes! This website and the activities associated with it were inspired by our recent town election on Tuesday, May 3rd, 2016. The turnout for that election was just 12.15% of registered voters in our town1. While this fraction is normal for our area2, it’s much lower than we want to see in a democracy. All of us residents as well as the candidates in our elections benefit from a higher turnout of informed voters at the polls.
Immediately after the election, some residents began brainstorming how we could improve voter turnout and familiarity with the candidates. Some of the ideas we came up with could only be implemented by town government and may require quite a bit of work and money. Other ideas can only be implemented by independent parties as it would be illegal for the town government to be involved. That’s where this website comes into play.
North Reading Votes will be working on some relatively simple measures to improve voter turnout and familiarity with the candidates in preparation for our next several elections. Subscribe to this blog to get updates about what we are doing and how you can help. And if you are interested in getting involved, please join our Facebook group!
Footnotes:
- North Reading, May 3, 2016: 12.15%
- Most recent town election held separately from state and federal:
Reading, April 7, 2016: 11.31%
Wakefield, April 26, 2016: 14.25%
Lynnfield, April 8, 2013: 21% (most recent year I could find info for; note election participation has generally been falling in recent years)
North Reading Votes 